| 2008 Triumph Tiger 1050 | | Print | |
| Written by Kenn Stamp | ||||||
| Monday, 22 September 2008 19:00 | ||||||
Page 1 of 4  Select photos by Brian Nelson and Tom Riles  There have been many underrated motorcycles throughout history; bikes that perform perfectly well, get good reviews, and yet, outside of a few enlightened individuals, fail to generate a huge following. Bikes like the Honda Hawk GT650, Suzuki Bandit 400, Yamaha YZF-600R, and the Triumph Tiger 1050 to name a few. Wait, the Tiger 1050? Isn't that a little new to be considered underrated? Well lets look at the facts; It seems that every journalist that has ridden it either loves it, or likes it a lot. Tiger 1050 owners unanimously love their bikes (at least the ones I've read about or talked to) and have no interest in getting rid of them. The Tiger is good looking (lots of people think so), has a fun and entertaining amount of power, and can do almost anything you ask of it. Unfortunately, the Tiger 1050 has not been a runaway sales success for Triumph. Why? I think the biggest issue is that not a lot of people seem to "get" the Tiger 1050. Many times I was asked "but what type of bike is it? It seems that motorcycle riders want to be able to classify their ride into one category or another. Why are we so interested in our motorcycles fitting into a specific category? Does it give us a sense of place in the motorcycling world?Does being able to say something like "my bike is a sport-touring bike therefore I am a sport-touring kind of person" validate who and what we are as motorcyclists? Before we delve too deeply into the murky and convoluted depths of philosophy let's look at what the Tiger 1050 can do and what it can't.  When Triumph re-designed the Tiger in 07 they decided to drop the pretense that it was an "adventure" bike as everyone knows that a bike of that size really isn't made for serious off road trail riding (although doing so does often lead to "adventures"). Instead Triumph decided to build the Tiger 1050 as an all-road bike; the kind of bike that would take the worst that the local D.O.T. could throw at it and laugh (growl?). A bike that when the going not only got tough but full of potholes and uneven pavement the tough (namely the Tiger 1050) would get going. To that end Triumph kept the bike tall and equipped it with a relatively long-travel suspension (5.9" of travel both front and rear) to eat up both the bumps in the road and sometimes the things that go bump in the night (was that an armadillo?). Another great benefit of a tall bike is the commanding view of the road and traffic around you. Looking over cars is much preferred to looking through them. A downside to a tall bike is that unless you, the rider, are also tall there will be an issue of contact between your feet and the ground. There are three ways to combat this issue; 1) Never stop. This, as one can imagine, is not very practical. 2) Grow or stretch your legs longer; again not very practical. 3) Offer a "low" seat option. Much more practical than the first two and the one that Triumph used to help make its bike more accessible to a wider range of body types. The Tiger 1050 that I tested did indeed have the low seat on it when I picked it up. Now I have a 32" inseam and while I was on tippy-toes while riding a different Tiger in Gatlinburg a few months ago (the stock seat height is 32.8"), I was on the balls of my feet on the test bike with both feet down so the low seat lowers the seat height by about an 1" I'd estimate. I did have a few other people of varying heights sit on the bike and the low seat seemed to work pretty well for a wide range of them. Triumph also makes a "tall" seat for those of you who play in the NBA.  Not only is the Low seat low but it is also a squishy gel seat to provide high levels of comfort for long rides. I can attest to the comfort level as, even after the 500 mile day I had bringing the bike back to the 2WF lair, I still felt like I could ride another 300+ miles with no issue. All is not perfect with the seat however as my wife and I found out one afternoon while running some errands. If you leave the bike outside in the sun for an hour or more the seat gets extremely hot. Not only is it hot on initial contact but it doesn't cool down like a normal foam filled seat will after a few minutes. During a 20 minute ride around town I actually was checking to see if the bike had caught on fire as the seat stayed hot for that long. Even after being off the bike for 3 hours the tops of our legs/bottom of our butts were still beet red. Triumph has been made aware of this and I'm sure is working very hard to figure out the design flaw in the gel seats. If you take precautions it shouldn't be too big of a problem and the comfort level of the seat for long rides greatly outweighs the heat issue. |
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| Last Updated on Tuesday, 03 August 2010 12:30 |